The golden spiral can be found frequently in art and nature, including some galaxies and nautilus shells. I was playing around with this shape and with a fractal design in a similar spiral, and came up with this geometric design.

This picture came from my playing around with shapes in Paint Shop Pro. I started with a spiky silver shape and repeated and rotated it until it seemed to make a good setting for an Easter egg, and the rest of the design followed from that. And I love all the shades of maroon, pink, lavender, and blue that come out in the spring and summer!

I wanted to try something metallic besides gold and silver, and I remember my high school Chemistry kit had a copper compound that was bright blue (azurite?), so I decided to try them together. Then these butterflies showed up fluttering across my screen and offered to pose for me, so here they are! Actually it's an Apophysis fractal that I thought looked like a butterfly. You have to have a good imagination working with fractals! This was also another attempt at drawing faceted gems.

Hiddenite , or Lithia Emerald, is a rare green gemstone. It was discovered in western North Carolina in 1879, and named after the geologist William Hidden.

This picture of course is not a photograph of actual hiddenite. It's a combination of my drawing with an Apophysis fractal for the background. I laid out the design to give the effect of heading into a dark cave where such gemstones might be mined. This piece was also an experiment in drawing faceted gems - they're harder than the round orbs.

This was one of my first fractal/abstract works. I was practicing how to make the jeweled orbs and metallic filigree. I think the jewel turned out pretty well, but the filigree was still a bit rough around the edges. I chose the title because I like the word “dusky” as well as the the dark grey/blue/purple color it sometimes signifies. A few months later when I got a grey kitten I named him “Dusky” too.